Brooks Koepka tee shot injures fan at Ryder Cup

Brooks Koepka tee shot injures fan at Ryder Cup

Brooks Koepka was “shaken up” Friday during his four-ball win at Ryder Cup and felt “terrible” after his tee shot hit a female spectator at Le Golf National.

Koepka hooked his drive at the par-four No. 6 hole and the ball hit a woman about 300 yards downfield, causing her to be injured in the face as he and Tony Finau defeated Justin Rose and Jon Rahm 1-up.

The woman suffered an injury above her right eye and was treated on site by attendants.

“I obviously saw her. It looked like it hurt. She was bleeding pretty good. It looked like it hit her right in the eye, so hopefully there’s no, you know, loss of vision or anything like that. But it’s not a fun feeling. I probably do it way more than I should. It seems just about every week we’re hitting somebody, and you know, it’s unfortunate. You’re never trying to,” he said.

Koepka yelled “fore” in a futile effort to alert those along the fairway. It was likely impossible to hear his warning so far away from the tee given the crowd size and noise.

“I didn’t actually see her at first,” he added. “I didn’t know I hit anybody and then someone from the crowd yelled, ‘You hit someone.’ And I turned around and then obviously you see someone’s lying on the ground, and you’re thinking, ‘oh (expletive) I did it again.’

“You can yell fore, but it doesn’t matter. If you’re 150 yards, you’re shouting fore, you can hear it. But from 300 yards, even if none of us said fore, she’s going to get hit, and that’s the unfortunate thing.”

A Ryder Cup spokesperson said the spectator was ” taken to the hospital as a precaution but doctors have confirmed the injury is not serious. The spectator does not have a broken nose, contrary to what some media announced.”

That should be some comfort to Koepka, who came upon the injured fan after being unaware what had happened.

“You feel terrible for them,” Koepka said. “You know exactly how they are feeling, especially when you’ve got to go over there and apologize, because they are in pain, usually bleeding, and then to hit her in the face is not—you don’t want to hit anybody in the face, especially not a woman, and it’s not a good feeling.”